Over the past 13 years, since I started to research my family history, I have acquired several old photographs of some of my ancestors and their families. My late mother helped me by putting names to faces and telling me what she could remember about them.

The picture above is of my great great grandparents, John and Mary Stacey, and probably their 4 youngest children.

Their youngest son George was born in 1882 so that would date this photograph mid to late 1880s.

I will start my thoughts with John and Mary who are the maternal branch of my family.

Tuesday, 7 June 2016

Family heirloom

This time last year Patricia Bucknell nee Stacey, who was the mother of my 3rd cousin Liz, died at the age of 89. I didn't know Liz until I started doing genealogy and we became acquainted via the internet. I met up with Liz on a visit to Yorkshire a few years ago and she was good enough to show me round some places where our common ancestors lived and worked. I didn't know about Patricia until recently so never spoke to my mother about her. According to Liz she used to visit Ravenfield where mum lived for a while and as she was only 4 years younger than mum perhaps they knew each other.

Our nearest common ancestor is our great great grandfather John Stacey. My great grandmother Everell Stacey was the sister of Liz's great grandfather John Stacey. Another of their siblings was Ann Stacey. Ann married Henry Broadhead and they had a daughter called Annie who was born in 1895. That makes Annie Broadhead my 1st cousin two times removed.

All this is lateral family history lateral family history and maybe a bit confusing. You may wonder what all this is leading to. In Victorian England many young ladies were brought up to be accomplished needleworkers. It appears that Annie was one of them. When Liz's mother died last year she had several pieces of needlework that had been made by Annie and Liz asked me if I would like one of them as she already had a few. I was happy to accept one as a family heirloom, albeit not by one of my direct ancestors.

It is not the kind of picture I would hang on my wall but the needlework is amazing. Such fine stitches and the colours are still very bright. It must have taken many hours to make. I don't think Annie would have been very old when she made it as I think they were the sort of things girls would do before they married. Annie was married in 1920 and as far as I know she had one son. Maybe that is why the embroideries were given to a cousin rather than passed on to a child.

Here are some close ups of the stitching.

Little lambs made of dozens of french knots. She must have had a lot of patience. It is a lovely keepsake and I will treasure it.